Nineteen

A Knave in Shining Armor

Philip had no clue what he had expected to find inside, but the outer trappings of a crumbling monastery had not prepared him for the scene of decadent opulence within.

The room was ablaze with a thousand tapers revealing what decency should have concealed in the dark. The walls were festooned with tapestries and every conceivable pornographic work. Oil paintings depicted nymphs and satyrs in flagrante delicto, while the walls bore placards bearing libertine maxims and sexually explicit witticisms.

Oriental rugs were scattered about a room decked out lavishly with Turkish divans and couches of silk and velvet, upon which sprawled numerous couples already engaged in the earlier stages of copulation.

Philip took a long draught from the glass of Madeira offered by one of the flock of wooden-faced servants who stood at the ready with flasks and chalices.

George had already emptied his own, and nudged his companion in the ribs. “A man could quickly accustom himself to this, eh Drake?” He then beckoned the footman for a refill.

Philip’s attention was drawn to the entrance of a man robed in crimson ceremonial garb topped with a cap trimmed in rabbit fur. The presumed master of ceremonies approached the raised platform with a smile for his guests. With the slightest inclination of his head, the doors were then closed and bolted from the inside.

With a signal to the cowled figure, a giant brass gong sounded, the resonance echoing throughout the chamber, shaking the crystal chandeliers and putting an abrupt halt to all the aforementioned activities.

“Now the fun begins,” George whispered with a gleam in his eyes.

“My dear brothers and honored guests,” the self-proclaimed Abbot of St. Francis began. “We gather in this holy of holies, the place of voluptuary worship for the professed profligate, to dedicate our newly erected Temple of Venus. And in this vein we do now offer up our first and our best sacrifice.” He raised his hands and cried, “Enter Persephone!”

A side door opened to a parade of women who sashayed into the chamber, clad in diaphanous robes exposing the left breast in the style of Venus Genetrix. At the rear guard, Philip recognized the notorious bawd “Mother” Elizabeth Ward dressed as Demeter. The earlier cowled figure revealed himself as Dashwood’s amanuensis, former poet and satirist Paul Whitehead. Between them, they dragged a bound and struggling young woman toward the sacrificial altar.

Dashwood addressed Mother Ward at their approach. “Do you, Demeter, freely and without constraint offer up your daughter Persephone as a pure and virgin sacrifice to the mother god Venus?”

“If I don’t, you shan’t find another in the entire of London. She likely be the only virgin left!” The retort set the whores cackling and the room rumbled in raucous, drunken laughter, but Dashwood frowned at the levity.

“Perhaps you should just repeat after me. I, Demeter, offer my virgin daughter, Persephone, to the mother god Venus.”

The sacrificial “virgin,” clearly not long out of girlhood, stood frozen before the altar with ashen face and quivering lips. “Mayhap Demeter offers her up, but Persephone appears none too eager to be sacrificed,” Philip murmured low to George.

“She’s indeed a fine performer!” George applauded. “Dashwood’ll surely pay her treble her normal take for this night’s work.”

“I fear you are mistaken, Bosky. Note how she trembles. No actress of Covent Garden is that good. I question if it’s an act at all.” Philip’s disquiet increased when the bawd tore the robe completely off the girl and pulled her, naked, screaming, and thrashing, onto the altar. As the trio proceeded to spread the girl’s legs and lash them into place, Philip asked George with rapidly escalating apprehension, “Precisely what does this sacrifice entail?”

Lord Sandwich spoke up from behind. “If it’s the shedding of blood you dread, fear not, ol’ man. The only blood sacrificed will be that of her maidenhead… if virgin she really be,” he spoke with a knowing wink.

“Surely an impressive actress, that one. No doubt I have seen her on the Drury Lane stage,” Selwyn remarked appreciatively while Sandwich ventured a more philosophical reply.

“’Tis really no matter whether she’s virgin or not. He’s likely too soused to know the difference if she isn’t, and if she is, by night’s end she’ll be well broken in… at least by the time you get your turn.” Sandwich signaled for more wine and then moved to the fore to obtain a better view.

“Can’t say I fancy another’s dirty leavings,” Philip murmured with no attempt to mask his contempt.

“Since when have you become so exacting in your requirements, Drake? Many a time we’ve shared a whore betwixt us.”

“And she was ever willing to be shared. I don’t countenance the same of this one.” Philip nodded toward the girl, having by this time ceased her struggles.

She lay across the raised platform, exposed for all to see. Her voice, hoarse from screaming, was now a mere whimper. Her breath came in short frantic pants. In desperation, she turned her head away from her captors. She frantically searched the room until her terror-stricken face was fully revealed.

“What in the devil’s name?” Philip exclaimed upon recognizing Nell, the barmaid from Tom King’s, and in that moment knowing for a certainty. “This is not a game, Bosky. The girl is not a willing party to this.”

“Good gad, Drake! What’s come over you? Suddenly you’ve become a bloody killjoy. I question why I brought you here!”

Philip posed his response deliberately. “While I enjoy a good romp as well as any man, I’ll not be a party to rape.”

“Rape? Is your mind disordered of a sudden?”

“By what other name would you call it, George?” Philip gestured to the dais, closely surrounded by leering men openly fondling themselves in anticipation of the show.

George’s visage suddenly flashed something akin to fear. “Pox on you, Drake, I haven’t a word for it! Nevertheless, you’ve no business to interfere.” George’s next words came out almost menacing. “See there—the Prince of Wales, and over there, the Secretary of the Admiralty. The room is filled with peers of the realm and members of Parliament. The Knights of St. Francis are twelve of the most powerful men in England and they’ll ruin you without a thought—if they don’t kill you first. If you mean to do anything foolhardy, I can’t stand beside you.”

“Then you may as well stand behind me and watch my back, as I can’t allow this madness to progress any further.” With a baffling sense of purpose and flagrant disregard of the repercussions, Philip drew his dress sword and elbowed through the throng to leap upon the stone dais.

“What the hell do you think you are doing? Who is this man!” Dashwood cried out to no one in particular.

“I am come to make my own offering to Venus.” Philip said, drawing the blade of his sword swiftly across his left hand and squeezing a steady trickle onto the altar.

Dashwood stood dumbfounded as Philip sliced through the restraints binding the girl. Realizing what Philip was about, Dashwood grabbed for Nell. Now freed, she evaded by scrambling on hands and knees to cower behind her protector. Philip extended his sword in warning. “I remind you, the requisite blood sacrifice is already made.”

“The hell it is!” Dashwood forced through clenched teeth. “Your blood is unacceptable. The rites of Venus require a virgin. Now give me the girl, you sodding sack of shit, before I’m moved to spill all of your blood on my altar.”

Philip met the threat without a flinch, but the terrorized Nell skittered further back to crouch, quavering and clutching at Philip’s coattails. Philip calmly reiterated, “If Venus requires virgin blood, my sacrifice will stand.”

He cast Philip a malevolent glare. “You name yourself a virgin?”

“I’ll fix that for ye, dearie,” one of the whores called out.

“Surely you do not gainsay me, Sir Francis.” Philip quirked an implicating brow. “Unless you claim to have been present upon the occasion…”

The remark caused a cacophony of teeters and snickers.

Dashwood’s reply was low and menacing. “There is but one answer to your insinuation.”

“But what a quandary for any gentleman to decide which accusation to defend—Blasphemy? Sodomy? Or attempted rape?”

Dashwood’s eyes bulged with murderous intent.

“When you decide, Sir Francis, pray direct your seconds to the George and Vulture.” Philip snatched the girl by the arm and headed straight to the side door from whence the harlots had entered, justly fearing that the hounds of hell would soon be hot on his heels.

“You’ve surely done it now, ol’ chap,” said George as he passed.

***

They navigated the passageway in complete darkness, not knowing where it would lead. Philip blessed Providence that they emerged just outside the stables. “Can you ride, Nell?” he asked the girl.

“N-no,” she answered.

He cursed aloud. “Why should you know to ride after all else that’s transpired this night?” He had spoken more to himself but she cringed in fear. “Damn it, girl. Do you think I would strike you when I’ve just risked my idiotic neck to remove you from that den of iniquity?”

He wasn’t sure if her teeth chattered more from fear or exposure to the cold night air, but in the midst of this contemplation it began to rain.

“Bugger it all!” he stripped off his coat and helped her into it. Perceiving the dim lantern light of the stables, Philip led her to crouch behind the adjacent hedgerow. “Just wait here and don’t make a sound.”

She clutched his sleeve frantically. “Yer not leavin’ me?”

“Don’t be daft! Even I am not so brazen to ride through the town with a half-naked girl behind me. I must go and find you something apart from my coat to cover yourself.”

“Y-you’ll come back?”

“Yes. Yes,” he snapped. “Do you think it likely I would now lay waste to an entire night’s heroics?” He heaved a sigh and turned for the stables.

After locating his horse and pilfering one of the rough monk’s robes for the girl, Philip took her up behind him for the three-hour ride back to London. The ride gave him ample time to reconsider his foolhardy impulsiveness. He felt like a wanted man, and suspected that he might very well soon find himself at Dashwood’s sword point.

What had come over him? He seemed now to be making a career out of misguided acts of chivalry. At least, aside from the incessant chatter of her teeth, Nell had the wisdom to remain silent. But what to do with her now?

He turned in the saddle to ask, “Why, Nell, after all this time did you decide to leave honest labor?”

“B-but I am still an honest girl,” she insisted with an injured sniff.

“Are you indeed? If that is true, how did you come to Medmenham Abbey?” he demanded with overt cynicism.

“’Twas by the conniving of Mistress Ward,” she said. “Like a grand lady, she comes by and offers me an apprenticeship at her milliner’s shop. At a shilling a day, mind ye. A far cry from me wages at the tavern, and a chance for a respectable trade to boot. But I wasn’t there a sennight afore I sees ’twas not a respectable establishment at all, but a house of wickedness she runs!

“When I tries to leave she locks me in the garret for three days wi’ only stale bread and water. It was so dark and the mistress says if I do what she tells me she won’t feed me to the rats! That’s when we goes in the carriage to the abbey.”

“Dashwood undoubtedly paid a good price for you too, if you were truly presented as a… maiden.”

She dipped her head in guilt. “I was saving myself, but when ye up and left t’other night…”

Philip felt a momentary flash of guilt that she would have waited for him, but knowing she’d have succumbed to another soon enough. “What the devil am I to do with you now?” he asked.

“Many fine gents keep a girl.” She ran one hand provocatively down his torso. He released one of his own from the reins to return hers to its place at his waist.

“Nell, please understand that I don’t have the means to keep a mistress… even if I was so inclined.”

“Y-you won’t try to sell me to another, will you?”

“God no! I’m no whoremonger, though I durst not cast the first stone,” he added deprecatingly. “Mother Ward and Francis Dashwood will go to the devil in their way and I in mine. Now, if you don’t wish to return to Tom King’s—”

“Lor’ no!” she cried.

“Then I am at a complete loss what to do with you. Where’s your family?”

“In Cheapside, but me Mum had so many mouths to feed. She’s a God-fearin’ woman, me Mum. She won’t want me back when she hears where I’ve been,” she sobbed.

“Good God, Nell! Don’t start weeping! Surely you have some other skill that will lend to gainful service in a respectable household.”

“B-but who would take me wi’out even me proper clothes?” she wailed.

“I’ll find you some bloody clothes. Now cease the whimpering while I figure this out.” She sniffed again, and he felt her wipe her streaming nose on the back of his coat.

“Devil take me this night!” he swore in exasperation.